Odette's Secrets
Maryann Macdonald
Language: English
Pages: 240
ISBN: 159990750X
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
Odette is a young Jewish girl living in Paris during a dangerous time. The Nazis have invaded the city, and every day brings new threats. After Odette's father enlists in the French army and her mother joins the Resistance, Odette is sent to the countryside until it is safe to return.
On the surface, she leads the life of a regular girl―going to school, doing chores, and even attending Catholic Mass with other children. But inside, she is burning with secrets about the life she left behind and her true identity.
Inspired by the life of the real Odette Meyers―and written in moving free-verse poetry―this is a story of courage, of determination to survive, and of a young girl forced to hide in plain sight.
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does hear me, night after night. Finally, she gets me what I’ve always wanted … a cat, to scare the mice away! I call her Bijou. She has spots and long white whiskers … she’s the cat of my dreams. We play “Catch the String” for hours. During the long winter evenings, chestnuts roast in the fireplace. Cabbage-and-onion soup simmers in the big black pot over the fire. Potatoes bake in the embers. Mama reads by the fire. The last sounds I hear before sleep are now just the tiny
Leon, who always had a smile and friendly words to say to me, barely has the strength to speak. I visit Leon every day after school. Our visits are always the same. He lifts the corner of his pillow and offers me a piece of the American gum he keeps there. Then he asks me a question, the same one every day: “What did you learn in school today?” I always save up something special to tell him. He’s so interested in my answers. I can tell by the way his large, dark eyes follow mine. I
work of fiction, but it is based very closely on a true story. Here is how it came to be. One late August afternoon a few years ago, I was walking through the Marais, an old Jewish neighborhood in Paris, with my husband. We passed an elementary school with a bronze plaque. The plaque honored the memory of the Jewish children, students at the school, who had been deported from France during World War II. I put my hand on the warm stone of the school, thinking of those children. Who were they? What
course!” she says. “I’ll tell you a secret. When your papa left for the army, I made a yellow blanket for him, just like yours. I stitched a holy medal on it, one of Saint George, the dragon slayer. He’s the patron saint of soldiers. I told your papa that whatever happens, he must hold on to that blanket. He promised me that he would bring it back home. So don’t worry. Your father will keep his promise.” What a good secret! Saint George is looking after Papa. They have the same
searching for who-knows-what? Just then, another voice. Madame Marie arrives at our door. “For shame,” she scolds the men, “disturbing the home of a French soldier! Don’t you know the wives of prisoners are to be left in peace?” “Excuse us,” says the leader. “There has been a mistake. Your letters, Madame.” He and his soldiers stomp out. “Marie,” says my mother, her voice still shaking, “I have money and papers hidden here. If they had found them….” She never finishes her